Homepage News

Come one come all to King's annual Celebration of Learning, held at the Portland Expo during the school day on May 10th. Guests are welcome to browse work from all of our students, talk to students and teachers about their learning, and get the big picture of life at King.

Along with parents, students, and local colleagues, we will be hosting national and international visitors. Thirty-five colleagues and education policy experts from Canada and Sweden will be at King in the morning as the kickoff for a two day conference on technology integration, sponsored by Governor Angus King's Maine Learning Technology Foundation. We will also be hosting educators from around the country who are coming to see project based learning and technology integration first hand.

Thanks to the teachers, parents, and community partners for a wonderful evening of performances and fund raising at the First Annual Faculty Talent Show and Silent Auction.

The event was attended by over 300 community members and raised nearly $3000 to support the annual seventh grade camping trip-- held at Camp Kieve next fall.

Please join us for a great community event and fundraiser at King on Thursday night. The silent auction begins at 6:00 and the fabulous entertainment starts at 6:30. Tickets are $5 for adults, $3 for students. Students must be accompanied by adults, please.

Nearly one-fifth of King students are participating in this year's spring drama club performance -- Annie Jr.

Please join us on the evening of April 11th or 12th for a night of singing and dancing. The show starts at 7 and the house opens at 6:30. Tickets are $4 for adults and $2 for students at the door.

Our spring student led conferences are scheduled for the end of the last week in March. Students will be in attendance only until 11:30 this Thursday and Friday to provide times for conferencing. Parents, if you have not heard from your child's homeroom teacher, please email your child's teacher (email list), or contact the school to schedule an appointment.

King Middle School Welcomes Visitors for Expeditionary Learning Schools National Conference March 20

Fifty teachers from around the country are visiting King on Wednesday March 21, on the first day of the Expeditionary Schools National Conference being held in Portland this week.

More than 750 visiting educators will be in Portland for the four day conference. King teachers will be attending and presenting master classes on developing and implementing learning expeditions, as well as welcoming visitors to the school throughout the week.

Student schedules have been changed to support the conference. York students will be off on Thursday. Windsor students will be off on Friday.

Students and Teachers of Windsor 6 Seeking Donations for Ongoing Hurricane Katrina Relief by Mrs. LeClair March 7

In Windsor 6's current expedition, The Forces Are with Us, we have been studying the four forces of nature: wind, heat, water, and gravity. As part of our expedition, we looked at what hurricane Katrina did to the area around New Orleans..

We are gathering supplies such as pencils, water colors, paint brushes, scissors, and glue. Please bring any donations to room 212. Thank you for your support!

King Students Learn What It Takes to Make a Book Thanks to Visit from Gandhi Publishing by Barbara March 6

For the past year-and-a-half, fourteen King students have had the chance to learn how to publish a book. Anne Sibley O'Brien and Perry O'Brien have come to KMS to get ideas for a new book about nonviolent resistance.

Nonviolent resistors stand up for issues of oppression and injustice that are important to them. Rather than lashing out violently, these people use their intellects to fight the battles.

The O'Brien's book in progress, originally called Look What Gandhi Started: 100 Years of Nonviolent Resistance, focuses on famous groups or people who have had an impact on society through nonviolent resistance. These include: Mohammed Ali, Aborigine Resistors, Mothers of the Disappeared, "Tank Guy" and Tiananmen Square, Nelson Mandela, the Dalai Lama, Seeds of Peace, Cindy Sheehan, Caesar Chavez, Martin Luther King Jr., Desmond Tutu, and Aung San Suu Kyi.

The reason that Anne and Perry O'Brien came to KMS was to better understand the thinking of 11-14 year olds -- the target age group for their book. Each student learned about one group in depth, and shared their knowledge. Then students edited and critiqued the authors' writing and the book's illustrations.

Gandhi Publishing has been a wonderful experience for students and teachers alike. Speaking as a member of the group, I can say that I now better understand nonviolent resistance as well as what it takes to produce a well-written book.

King Teachers and Students Grateful for the Opportunity to Go to Work in February
Feb 16

The Junior Achievement National Job Shadow Day on February 2 was a great experience for King 8th graders. Students were exposed to a wide variety of jobs and many got to actually be involved instead of standing back and watching. We are very thankful for all the great work of our hosts: Goodwill Industries, MEMIC, Portland Harbor Hotel, Sheraton, Embassy Suites, Verizon, Best Buy and Old Country Buffet. Take at look at one of those experiences (MEMIC).

We are planning a parent informational event on Thursday, February 8. The topic will be "How to Protect Your Child in Cyberspace". The presenter will be Ms. Inez Dudley of the Maine State Police Computer Crimes Task Force. The idea for this presentation grew out of a discussion with our Title I Parent Advisory Council. The event will be held Thursday, February 8 from 6:00 P.M. - 7:30 P.M. This event is for parents only .

Through the efforts of Junior Achievement, both Windsor 8 and York 8 will be be out of the building to visit a variety of Portland businesses participating in Job Shadow Day. Students will be matched to their interests and will spend a few hours visiting the working world. It will also be treated as a "get to work" day, so students will be walking and using public transportation to get to their destinations. Groups will be led by 1-2 teachers.

New Year Off to Good Start as Teachers and Projects Bring in $13,000 in Funding January 22

Peter Hill, science teacher in Windsor 8, received a $2600 award from National Semiconductor on Tuesday. He plans to use the money to purchase computer probes that will enable students to collect and analyze real data as they monitor air quality in and around King.

The award from National Semiconductor was among several awards that will support expeditions this winter and spring. More...Apple recently contributed $5000 to support computer intergration and project based learning, and to support Expeditionary Learning. Other recent awards include $3,300 from L. L. Bean to support fieldwork, and more than $1600 awarded to Kelly Fitz-Randolph and the York 6 team to be used in colloboration with Cultivating Communities and Portland Trails to develop a community garden at King.

Around the World in 80 Minutes Performance this Thursday at 6:30 pm by Erika, January 17

On Wednesday, a large group of students from King Middle School held the 3rd annual production of Around the World in 80 Minutes at Reiche Elementary School. Tomorrow there is a second performance to be held on Thursday at 6:30 pm in the King cafetorium.

The production features a variety of very diverse performances including a Central American dance, an original take on the "I Have a Dream" speech by the King Civil Rights Team, and much much more.

Windsor 8 Celebrates Expedition Culmination with Young America's Cup Regatta January 16

Join the students and teachers of Windsor 8 on Wednesday from 10 - 11:30 at the King Cafetorium for the Young America's Cup Regatta. Students will be racing boats, and displaying work from the Windsor in Motion Expedition.

More than half of King's 500 students recognized for effort and academic honor roll. See the complete list here.

The King website has hundreds of examples of student work from expeditions. A lot of great work done by students, however, isn't part of any expedition product, and hasn't found a place to live on the site. Now that has changed.

To learn how you can create your own pages and publish your original songs, art, poetry, etc., visit Student Pages.

It's the end of the calendar year, and just like at home, many houses are busy at King wrapping up projects and expeditions.

York 7 is having its culmination for 1000 Years without a Bath? at the State Street Church this Thursday starting at 10 am. Students take the stage to share their skits about life in the Middle Ages. Stick around for the medieval feast.
Join York 8 on Wednesday from 4 - 6 pm at Grapheteria for the art opening of Four Freedoms, an expedition on civil liberties and social responsibility. The collages and artist statements of all students will be hung in the studio's gallery. If you can't make it on Wednesday, stop by over the holidays.

Windsor 8 has will be be holding its culminating event for WINDsor in Motion on January 17th at King. The event will include a regatta of student made boats, as well as a gallery of work from all of the classes on the expedition.

On Thursday, December 6th, King hosted 30 visitors from three different states. We asked King’s principal, Mr. McCarthy, why these visitors are here. “They’re interested in beginning expeditionary learning in their schools,” he told us. “They want to teach expeditions like we do here at King, and they heard that the kids and teachers here do a good job.” We had an opportunity to speak with three of the visitors.

[I like] the student behavior, it’s very good, and how the students seem to manage themselves. The expeditions are very interesting. -- Ms. Parker from Jackson, Tennessee

I have been teaching in an expeditionary learning school for one year and I wanted to see one that has been very successful for a long time.
Mr. Lawrence, Math and Science, Andover, Massachusetts --

I came here because my school is interested in starting expeditionary learning. I was especially fascinated by the medieval expedition in York 7.
-- Ms.Tubbs, teacher of 32 years, from Jackson, Tennessee

On Wednesday, December 6th, King is hosting 30 visitors from Tennessee, Massachusets and Maine. The visiting teachers and administrators are coming to see Expeditionary Learning in practice, and take back ideas and practices to their schools. We are looking forward to welcoming the visitors and sharing our work.

• King hosting Expeditionary Learning National Conference, March 22 - 24;
• King Celebration of Learning (our open house to the public), May 10.

All King students and parents will be sharing student work at our fall student-led conferences before the Thanksgiving break. Please make sure that you and your child know your appointment time. If you have any questions or need to reschedule the conference, please contact your child's homeroom teacher.

Welcome to the new King site! Our goals in redesigning the site include creating a great public stage for student work, providing a powerful and effective tool for communicating with our King families, and sharing our best practices internally, as well as with the broader education community in Portland and beyond.

Why are you getting results from the search tool that have King addresses but don't connect to anything? Actually, the results relate to the old site, which is gone but still indexed by Google. Google's search tools regularly "crawl" the web, updating their index. How long will it take for the new site to be indexed? I don't know how fast Google crawls, but it will be interesting to find out. Stay tuned.

Behind the new site design lies a new architecture for organizing the content and pages. If you have pages that you have previously bookmarked, they will no longer do the job. Sorry about that. Have fun setting up your new bookmarks by exploring the new kmsweb.